“be merciful to me and hear my prayer”
It is impossible to know exactly when King David might have written Psalm 4, but it’s not difficult to come up with possibilities because no biblical story, save the gospels, is as complete, as much a great novel, as the story of King David. No Old Testament story has so complete a record of triumphs—but then, no OT story includes so many tales of woe.
No one will ever know, but it could have been sometime around the story of the curse of Shimei, son of Gera (II Samuel 16). Shimei came from King Saul’s tribe, the people of the King whom David had replaced. There remained in him, and probably others, more than a little animosity.
To say that King David is on the skids at the time of Shimei’s cursing is a royal understatement. Running away the way he is, David seems more a buffoon than a king. His rule has turned into disrule because of a flashy charismatic politico with looks to die for. For years, this national idol has stood just outside the palace and pandered to the people, promising them the justice he claimed they’d never get from the dirty rotten King. The Bible says this demi-god wouldn’t let people bow before him; instead, he’d kiss them. “He stole the hearts of the men of Israel”—that’s the Word of God.
Human beings are drawn to beauty like flies to honey. Some things don’t change.
But David is on the run, literally, at the time of Shimei’s curse, hoping simply to save his own hide. It’s not a pretty time in the history of King David’s kingship.
Enter this man Shimei, a bit player really, a loudmouth who becomes the voice of King David’s own horror. Instead of bowing to the King, Shimei hurls insults. “The Lord has repaid you for all the blood you shed in the household of Saul,” he screams. “You have come to ruin because you are a man of blood.”
Must have stood the royal court on edge.
David listens to the tirade, and when one of his aids begs permission to lop off Shimei’s head, he won’t hear of it. “Leave him alone,” he says; “let him curse, for the Lord has told him to.”
The charismatic rebel attempting to usurp the throne is, as you know, the King’s own son, Absalom. Everyone knows it. David says that if his own son hates him as much as he does, how much more should this man of the tribe of the former king?
King David’s worrying can make Hamlet’s dilly-dallying seem minor league. He’s a world-class brooder. He’s capable of remarkable bravery, as well a species of intense, selfless faith some might almost call blind. Some modern analysts believe him to be bi-polar because his emotional valleys run fully as deep as his almost perilous highs (remember that wild strip tease when he led the Ark back to Jerusalem?). But right here, with Shimei’s stinging public rebuke still echoing down the walls of the castle, he’s in as dark a place as he’s ever been found. Somewhere reverberating in his soul are the words of Nathan, too—the curse on his house after Uriah and Bathsheba.
I’m speculating, about all of this. Shimei’s screed may not be the point in time when David’s sleeplessness prompted him to write Psalm 4. Lord knows there were other such moments.
But if you want to feel the dislocation so much the pattern of this psalm, think about David, a victim of his own beloved son’s treachery.
“Have mercy on me, Lord,” he says.
That’s no cliché.
Lord, have mercy.
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